Uncle Tom's Cabin
Harriet Beecher Stowe, Hammatt Billings
eBook
(Dover Publications, April 18, 2017)
Uncle Tom's Cabin; or, Life Among the Lowly, is an anti-slavery novel by American author Harriet Beecher Stowe. This novel has earned the title of not only bestseller, but also the first protest novel to have a direct impact on political events. The story follows the life of Uncle Tom, a noble negro, and portrays the humanity of an enslaved black people and the moral evil of their enslavement.Uncle Tom, Topsy, Sambo, Simon Legree, little Eva: their names are American bywords, and all of them are characters in Harriet Beecher Stowe's remarkable novel of the pre-Civil War South. Uncle Tom's Cabin was revolutionary in 1852 for its passionate indictment of slavery and for its presentation of Tom, "a man of humanity,"as the first black hero in American fiction. Labeled condescending by some contemporary critics, it remains as hocking,controversial, and powerful work -- exposing the attitudes of white nineteenth-century society toward "the peculiar institution" and documenting, in heartrending detail, the tragic break up of black Kentucky families "sold down the river." An immediate international sensation, Uncle Tom's Cabin sold 300,000 copies in the first year,was translated into thirty-seven languages, and has never gone out of print: its political impact was immense, its emotional influence immeasurable.